Federal Buildings

About 40 percent of federally owned and leased buildings are found in areas where the risk of earthquake damage is moderate to very high, but little has been done to make the structures--or workers--safer. Even though buildings are located within the same seismic risk zone, damage to buildings would vary because of factors such as construction type and soil properties. Most agencies lack comprehensive data on these factors, so it is not possible to determine which buildings are more vulnerable than others. Although earthquakes threaten many federal buildings and employees, agencies' efforts to reduce building vulnerability have been limited. Agency officials did not have complete data on funds spent or needed to strengthen buildings. Four of the six agencies GAO reviewed estimated that they will need about $2 billion collectively to make their buildings more earthquake-resistant. Officials cited the lack of funding as a major impediment to improving seismic safety.

GAO found that: (1) about 40 percent of federally owned or leased buildings are located in seismically active areas, with about 15 percent of buildings located in areas of high to very high seismic risk; (2) the total acquisition value of 183,000 federally owned buildings in areas of moderate to very high seismic risk is about $34 billion; (3) buildings' construction type and soil properties contribute to their vulnerability to earthquake damage; (4) most agencies lack comprehensive data on those factors, making it difficult to determine the extent of building vulnerability; (5) the six federal agencies that manage over 85 percent of federal space have made only limited seismic safety or risk reduction efforts; (6) agencies attributed their slow progress in completing seismic studies to limited funding and competing design and construction projects, and four agencies estimated that it would require a total of $2 billion to complete engineering studies and retrofit projects; and (7) while three agencies have programs that give priority to leasing seismically safe space, the other three agencies assume that leased buildings are safe if constructed according to local building codes, which do not necessarily ensure seismic safety.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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